After witnessing Tael’s fighting skills, Aila became lost in thought. Seeing how well he fought, it seemed he still retained his abilities as an emperor.

“What are emperors usually good at? Hmm, perhaps hunting or painting?”

Aila went into the house under repair and rummaged through a corner, pulling out some paint and paper. They were items she had used and preserved long ago.

Though she hadn’t used them for a very long time, they were too precious to throw away.

Paint was a rare commodity, not easily obtained.

If Jeffrey hadn’t given them as a gift, Aila wouldn’t have had them.

“Well, I might as well use them.”

After all, no matter how carefully she preserved them, things weren’t going to work out with Jeffrey anyway.

Aila went to find Tael and handed him the paint and paper.

“Want to try drawing something?”

If he drew well, she could sell it at the market. Tael asked suspiciously:

“What’s your scheme?”

“Nothing. You might have a hidden talent. If you draw well, we can make money. That would be good, right?”

Tael turned his head sharply.

“No thanks. I have nothing to draw.”

“Just try once. Maybe something you like. Or something you dislike or want to remember.”

“Something I want to remember?”

Tael stared intently at Aila. Aila who mercilessly worked him to the bone. The woman who called him horse dung and fed him rotten potatoes.

He narrowed his eyes.

“Yes, there is something I don’t want to forget.”

“Great!”

Aila placed the paint in Tael’s hand.

“Draw that, then.”

Tael stared at Aila as if he would never forget her.

“I’ll definitely draw it. So I won’t forget anything.”

After Aila left satisfied, a beautiful masterpiece was born in his hands a short while later.

“The distortion is severe.”

He had drawn Aila, but accidentally made her too beautiful. And he had drawn two of her.

‘I meant to draw casually, but why did I create a masterpiece? Ah, I wanted to remember that woman clearly.’

As he was getting up to put it away in a corner, Aila walked in. She looked at the drawing, her eyes sparkling, and asked:

“You drew it really well. But who did you draw? It seems strangely familiar.”

“Take it. It’s a useless drawing.”

“Great!”

Aila smiled brightly.

“I can sell it at the market. The drawing is beautiful, so someone will probably buy it. Get up. Let’s go sell it right away.”

Tael turned away without attachment.

He didn’t know this would be a decision he would regret. He had no idea whose hands this drawing would end up in.

–

The Arniel Palace was dazzlingly splendid, reflecting the vast wealth of the great empire. It was a country so overflowing with money that even frequently touched doorknobs were inlaid with gold.

Ministers were gathered in the conference room there.

“How is it possible that we still haven’t found His Majesty’s body?”

The imperial ministers were anxious.

“We’ve searched the mountains thoroughly, but there’s no sign of him. The landslide was so severe that no matter how much soil we dig through, we can’t see the end.”

As the ministers discussed, someone spoke up, looking pale:

“What if His Majesty isn’t dead, but alive somewhere…?”

The ministers’ faces all turned white simultaneously.

“How would he punish us…?”

“We must find him quickly. Before His Majesty becomes enraged! If that monster learns of this, he’ll purge all the nobles again…”

“How dare you! Calling His Majesty a monster!”

An elderly Grand Duke with a white beard stepped forward.

“He is the one who made this country a great empire.”

“……”

“It was he who disposed of the incompetent former emperor, prince, and empress, and it was he who put you all in your positions. Without His Majesty, neither the current empire nor any of you would exist. So mind your words.”

The ministers could say nothing more and kept their mouths firmly shut.

The Grand Duke rose from his seat and left the conference room first. Outside, he spoke in a worried voice to a noble who followed him:

“We must find His Majesty quickly. If we delay further, the Second Prince will soon invade.”

“His Majesty is being punished for k*lling the First Prince and disposing of the former Emperor and Empress when he was a prince.”

“Are you saying that was His Majesty’s fault? They tried to kill him first. It was the First Prince who threw a child among monsters. The former Emperor and Empress simply stood by and watched.”

“The way he killed the First Prince was too cruel. And even after taking the throne, he couldn’t find stability and started wars of conquest. No matter how good the results, his methods were so ruthless that many whisper His Majesty is insane.”

“If His Majesty hadn’t struck first, he would have been dead long ago.”

The Grand Duke’s face grew somber, as if recalling a terrible past.

“They say His Majesty is insane? They drove him to it. From the moment he was born, he couldn’t live a single day in peace, so he couldn’t endure without going mad.”

“……”

“He was like a deserted island in this palace. Neither the parents who gave birth to him nor the siblings he grew up with. No one understood His Majesty. They only tried to kill him, calling him a monster.”

Just then, a knight urgently approached the Grand Duke and said:

“Grand Duke, we’ve found the bodies of all the other knights. Since only His Majesty’s body remains missing, he must be alive somewhere.”

“Hmm, as expected.”

“His Majesty will overcome any situation and return.”

“Yes, I know. He’s the kind of person who could build an empire even in a wasteland.”

The Grand Duke thought of Targaniel, called the Lord of Blood. Though he was the son of the Second Empress, he was born with a prophecy that a great emperor would be born.

Because of this, he faced numerous assassination attempts from the First Empress and the other princes.

But when these failed, the First Empress turned her arrows toward exterminating the Second Empress’s entire family. The Second Empress, unable to endure, abandoned everything and left, but there was no mercy.

In the end, the Second Empress’s father, who was merely a minor noble, collapsed helplessly, and the Emperor thoroughly ignored the situation.

The Grand Duke remembered Targaniel as a child, crying in secret after losing his mother.

He had sobbed that he was scared and lonely.

After that, Targaniel never cried again.

No matter what crisis arose, he never showed weakness. He only became more cruel.

Targaniel had overcome countless crises alone. He would surely overcome this crisis as well.

Nevertheless, the Grand Duke sighed with worry.

“He’s such a picky eater, I’m concerned he might be starving.”

–

In the yard of Aila’s house.

Tael was lazily sweeping the yard with a broom, carrying out the task Aila had assigned him.

He did his best, but for some reason, the yard wasn’t getting any cleaner.

But that wasn’t his concern.

What mattered was that he “did it.” As he was busily making a mess of the yard, he sniffed the air, then frowned.

“Potato soup again.”

Saying this, he quietly set the broom aside and sneaked into the kitchen, then quickly ran out. Aila shouted at Tael, waving a ladle:

“Hey! Horse dung! Aren’t you coming back?!”

“I did nothing wrong. It’s your fault for carelessly rolling potatoes around.”

“You snatched the one that fell!”

“……”

Tael evaded the pursuing Aila and lightly jumped over the wall with a potato in his mouth.

“What?! Where did you go?!”

Hearing Aila’s angry voice, Tael pressed his back against the wall and briefly held his breath.

When Aila’s voice disappeared, Tael exhaled softly and quickly devoured the potato like a beggar.

Only after eating the last bite did he notice the child beside him.

It was Melia, Aila’s youngest sister.

Melia was crouched by the wall, eating a cookie. Tael crouched in front of her and said seriously:

“I have a request for you.”

“Yes?”

“Would you share one with me?”

“Sure!”

Melia willingly offered him one.

“As expected, you’re a child with loyalty.”

Tael asked while eating the cookie:

“But where did these cookies come from? I doubt that ill-tempered woman bought them.”

Melia answered with a bright, innocent smile:

“I picked them up from Jeffrey’s brother’s trash can!”

“…You picked them up from the trash?”

Just as Tael spat out the cookie he had put in his mouth, Melia popped another one in.

“Have one more!”

Tael was dumbfounded. He wanted to spit it out, but it was too delicious to spit out a second time.

“Big brother! Want me to show you a tastier way to eat them?”

“……”

Melia scattered cookies on the ground, ate one herself, and then picked up three more and stuffed them all at once into Tael’s mouth.

“!”

Melia giggled.

“Tasty, right?”

Tael’s body trembled. To taste dirt on his tongue! This was humiliation.

But eating cookies in this house was not an easy thing.

Every day, he ate nothing but soup with ingredients unrecognizable except for potatoes and carrots, and dry bread. Cookies thrown away by rich households tasted different.

They were fantastically sweet and delicious.

Painfully reminding him that he was merely a “slave.”